Undercurrent
by Sophia Hawkins
Summary: Near Halloween, a call goes wrong and a firefighter is injured. The crew of Firehouse 51 try to find out what happened, but the answer might not be anything they could expect.
1. Chapter 1

Undercurrent

Herrmann looked up at the rain continuing to beat down on all of them and the city of Chicago in general. It had been pouring down all day and showed no sign of letting up soon. Several counties in the state were already in flash flood watches and reports had been coming in of roads washed out in neighboring cities.

"Last week the padre was talking about the End of Days," Herrmann yelled to be heard over the roar of the rushing water, "This sure seems like a sign to me."

"Yeah, time to move to Florida!" Cruz replied.

"Florida's got hurricanes!" Otis yelled into Cruz's ear.

Cruz turned to him and gestured like Otis had just asked a very simplistic question. "Otis, how could that be any worse than this?"

"200 mph winds, that's how!" Otis answered.

"HUH?" Cruz turned his head to the side and pushed his ear up by Otis's mouth.

"THE WINDS!"

"YEAH I CAN SWIM!" Cruz yelled back at him.

Otis shook his head and rolled his eyes.

As if on cue, a howling wind came up that was strong enough to jolt the firemen even in their 80 pounds of turnout gear. In fact if they hadn't been wearing it, some of them felt like they might've been completely knocked down by the sheer force.

The front doors slammed open on the building Severide and Casey were exiting, as they walked back to their crews, Severide shouted to be heard over the screaming winds, "That's the last of it, let's go!"

"Look at that!" Herrmann gestured out to the intersection, "Water's standing now!"

"Gonna be a hell of a drive back to 51," Casey said as everybody climbed back on the rigs.

They'd barely gotten the doors shut when dispatch came over their radios about a person trapped at an address that was nearby. It was an unnerving drive through the rising water, but they made it, and when they pulled up in front of the house, they saw two people in rain boots and plastic ponchos treading water to make their way over to the fire truck.

"What's going on?" Casey asked as they got out.

The woman pointed to the house directly ahead, "It's the McIntyres, they're deaf, we tried getting in to see if they were alright, the doors won't budge, the basement window's busted and water's running in, their son lives down there."

"How many people?"

"Just the three of them."

"Okay, we'll take it from here, get back inside," Casey told them.

"Please hurry!" the woman said as the two of them treaded through the water to get back to their own home.

Casey looked up at the two story house that was tall enough to be a three story, and tried to imagine the possible obstacles they'd be facing upon entering.

"Cruz, raise the aerial," Casey ordered, "There's no telling what we'll be getting into, we may have to get out from the second floor, and if they're already up there it'll be that much easier."

"On it, lieutenant!"

They got the irons out of the rig and tried breaking the front door open but all they succeeded in doing was pulverizing the wood, but the door wouldn't move.

"Something's blocking it," Kelly said, "let's try the back door."

"Might not be time," Casey replied. "You take the aerial, I'll bust one of the windows down here, we better find out what we're walking into anyway, and if anybody's upstairs it'll be an easy rescue."

"Good idea," Kelly agreed and went over to the truck.

Casey made his way down the porch steps, and went around to the huge front window and smashed the glass with a sledgehammer. Huge shards of glass dropped like icicles falling in spring thaw. He swept out the biggest shards with his gloved hands and climbed up on the sill and looked in. The house was dark but he could see the floor was fairly dry. He reached for his radio. "No water on the ground floor yet, anything up there?"

"I'm in," Kelly answered, "No sign of anybody yet."

Casey waved for the others to come in through the window. "Remember we're looking for 3 deaf people, calling out won't do any good, just start looking." He made his way to the front door and saw that it had been blocked with an antique chest of drawers pushed up against it. He maneuvered it away from the door and against the wall and pulled the splintered pieces of wood away that used to be the front door. If anybody was on the ground floor, they'd have an easy escape now. He turned on his helmet flashlight and looked around for any sign of anybody, he heard the others calling from various rooms, he stepped from the front hall, to the dining room, into the living room. He didn't see anyone but he knew it was possible somebody could be hiding or unconscious behind the furniture. He took a step towards the couch, and heard a sickening crunch as he suddenly felt a sharp pain as he realized the floor had broken away under him and he fell through the rotted boards.

His scream could be heard loud and clear on everybody's radio.

"What the hell?" Kelly was making his way down the front stairs when he heard it. "Casey? Casey!" He stepped to the next room, and felt his heart sink when he saw the hole in the floor. "Casey!"

He hunkered down by the hole and looked down. It was dark but he could hear the distinctive sound of water splashing, and heard both through the hole, and on his radio, the sickening sounds of Casey screaming. Kelly's blood ran cold. That wasn't a hurt scream. It was sheer terror and panic.

"Casey, I'm coming!"

He made his way to the back of the house and caught up with the others and very quickly caught them up on what had happened. He found the basement door and made his way down five steps when he heard the wood splintering and screamed as he felt himself falling, and then felt himself land in a body of water.

"Mayday mayday mayday!" he called out on his radio, "Casey and I are trapped in the basement, the stairs are gone, the basement's flooded with about four feet of water, Casey..."

He looked ahead and saw Casey, just barely with his head above the water, screaming and writhing and struggling.

"Casey!"

Kelly pushed himself forward, with much difficulty with his turnout gear being weighted down by the water, and grabbed Casey and jerked him so he was slightly higher above the water. Actually _standing_ in the water wasn't a good possibility for either of them right now with the water rushing around the room and their movements adding to the force of the water washing around them, and Casey didn't seem to realize he was out of immediate danger, he was still screaming and flopping around.

"Casey! Calm down!" Kelly realized he wasn't getting anywhere and told the others over his radio, "Casey fell through the floor, I think he's in shock, we need help!"

"We're on our way, Kelly," Tony's voice came back over the radio in response.

Kelly wasn't sure it would do any good but he tried to get through to Casey, who for some reason seemed intent on throwing himself forward in the water as if trying to hastily get away from something. He grabbed Casey and tried to pull him to his feet, then finally realized what one of the big obstacles was and grabbed at Casey's turnout coat and tried to get it off of him. 30 pounds less to haul over to the stairs would be that much easier for both of them. For that matter Severide tried to get his own coat off too, it wasn't doing him any good now.

"Severide!" Herrmann called from up at the door, "Get over here!"

"I'm trying!" Kelly replied as he tried, and failed, to ignore the freezing cold water seeping through his gear and sticking his clothes to his skin, as he tried to move, tried to keep his balance, tried to keep Casey balanced and tried to restrain the Truck lieutenant who was hysterical with panic. He lost his grip on Casey and the blonde man fell face first into the water. Kelly grabbed him and jerked him up and got them moving again.

"We got the family, the house is cleared," Herrmann announced as they lowered the webbing.

"Nobody down here!" Kelly called up as he got the webbing secured around Casey's waist and shoulders. Casey wasn't screaming anymore but instead was coughing and choking. Kelly gave the makeshift harness a final jerk to make sure it was secure and he clapped a firm hand on Casey's back and told him, "You're okay." He looked up to the door and hollered to the men up there, "Pull him up!"

It seemed like forever for them to finally get Casey up to the ground floor, then send the webbing back down for Kelly to tie around himself, by the time he felt his feet leaving the water, he was chilled clear to the bone. That was immediately forgotten about as he stepped through the threshold and saw Casey down on all fours vomiting up the water that had been forced down his lungs, and every breath in between sounded like his whole body was being ripped apart.

"We gotta get him to Med," Kelly said, just realizing now he had no idea the extent of the injuries Casey sustained from falling through the floor and the impact of hitting the cement floor below even with four feet of water to help break the fall. He knelt down beside Matt and asked him, "Casey, can you get up?"

Matt shook his head miserably from side to side and went into another choking fit, but nothing came up.

"Ambo can't get a gurney in here through that mess," Herrmann said.

"Then we'll take him out ourselves," Kelly said, he turned back towards Casey and asked him, trying to figure out if it was even safe to move him as it was, "Casey, what hurts?"

Casey suddenly made an exhaling sound similar to a balloon being deflated and collapsed face first on the floor.

"Casey!"

Kelly rolled him over onto his back, and with little more than the illumination of their flashlights to see by they could all recognize the unmistakable pale ashen skin, the slightly bluish tinge around his lips, and the frighteningly enlarged pupils.

"He's in shock, we need to move him now!" Kelly said.

Everybody gathered round to lift Casey as quickly and steadily as possible. Severide gave the count, "Now!" and as one they picked him up, kept his legs slightly elevated, kept his head flat, and carried him to the door, trying to keep his body stiff as a board until he could be further assessed for injuries. Casey's breathing was rapid, so was his pulse.

"We need oxygen _now_!" Kelly hollered over to the paramedics as they made their way out the front door and carried Casey down the steps and through the standing water.

They got Casey loaded in the back of 61, got his legs elevated, got him on oxygen and wrapped in two blankets. Kelly hopped in alongside him and told the man who was making the oxygen mask fog up with his rapid breaths and stared straight up, his large pupils not seeming to focus on anything, "Stay with me, buddy, we're gonna be at the hospital in no time and you're going to be fine, and I'm going to be right with you the whole way."

Kelly wished he felt as confident as he sounded, against the floor of the ambulance he felt his knees shaking, and it had nothing to do with him being drenched to the bone.


	2. Chapter 2

Casey woke up to the sound of his own teeth chattering and the feeling of his whole body shaking. He found himself in a room at Med, and he was laying in a hospital bed covered with a blanket, and looked over and saw Severide sitting next to the bed.

"What happened?" he asked.

"Well," Kelly tried to lighten the mood, "I guess you could say you went for a swim."

"Huh?" Casey asked.

"Sorry...you went through the floor and landed in the basement, which _was_ flooded," Kelly explained.

Casey's eyes moved every which way as he tried to remember and tried to take in what Severide had told him.

"And now?" Casey asked.

"Docs say you got lucky, nothing broken in the fall, just some scrapes and cuts, and bruises..." he listened to Casey's knees knocking together and the 'brrrr-r-r-r' sounds working up from his throat. "Oh yeah, and your temperature's currently 96.5."

"What?"

"Doc wasn't worried, said it'll get back to normal in time," Kelly told him.

"Can I get out of here?" Casey asked.

"Not right away I don't think, they want to keep you for observation just to make sure there aren't any hiccups."

"What're you doing here? Why aren't you back at 51?" Casey asked.

"They checked me over, said I got a little banged up during the fall, I'm also waiting for my temperature to get back up."

"What's yours?"

"97.8."

"Showoff," Casey sneered.

"Do you remember anything from the fall, Casey?"

Casey's eyes moved around again, trying to remember.

"Something..."

Before he could say what it was, Boden entered the room.

"Good, you're awake."

"Is everybody here?" Casey asked as his teeth continued chattering.

"We're heading back. Herrmann's taking over as acting lieutenant, when you get discharged I want you to go home and take it easy."

Casey felt like he'd been punched in the gut. "Chief..."

"I don't want any argument, Casey."

"But...the doc said I'm fine," Matt pointed out, not liking whatsoever the idea of being sent home and taken off shift.

"No, he said you'll _be_ fine once your body temperature's back up," Boden corrected him.

"I could get it up again a lot quicker at work," Casey weakly insisted.

"Not if we get another call like this," Boden shook his head. "The water in that basement was estimated 65 degrees, enough for hypothermia to set in, the outside temperature's dropped to 50 degrees, wind chill is 45, and it's still pouring down, you are _not_ going into another flooded house in your condition, Casey."

Casey drew his bottom lip into his mouth and dug his teeth into the skin under it and hung his head in defeat, drawing his lip back out he reluctantly conceded, "Yes, sir."

There was a brief silence in the room, but Casey could feel two sets of eyes on him.

"I am not punishing you, Casey, I am looking after your best interests. I want you back on next shift, you already risked getting pneumonia once today," Boden told him.

Casey nodded hesitantly, "I understand."

Reluctantly, Severide got up from his chair and told Casey, "See you tomorrow."

"Yeah, thanks," Casey said as he laid back against the pillow and drew his blanket up tighter.

* * *

"If these storms don't stop, this is going to be one hell of a Halloween," Herrmann said that night as everybody headed to the bunk room to crash until another call came in, or morning came, whichever occurred first.

"Yeah, washed out," Otis replied. "Has it _ever_ rained this much in October before?"

"Not usually rain, sometimes by now we've already had a foot of snow," Cruz replied.

Otis made a sound in his throat, "Never thought I'd be anxious for winter to hurry up and get here."

"I'm telling you, if this weather is a sign of things to come, it's time to transfer out of state entirely," Cruz said.

"Hey, you two try leaving 51 and leaving us high and dry, I'm going to murder both of you," Herrmann warned them.

"That's what I like about you, Herrmann," Otis said sarcastically, "you always make _sooo_ much sense."

"Ah shaddup."

Severide wasn't paying much attention to what the others were talking about. They'd had one call after another after another, and though Herrmann was fairly competent and adequate as a lieutenant, it just seemed more exhausting without Casey there to help. He went to his quarters, didn't even bother closing the door behind him, marched over to his bunk and collapsed on it face first.

When Kelly woke up, everything was dark. It took him a minute to remember where he even was, and then it all came back to him. He rolled over and through the open door could hear everybody out in the bunk room asleep. He hoped there wouldn't be anymore calls for the rest of the shift, or at least until the sun came up. He got up from the bed and ducked out to the bathroom. On his way back, walking through the darkened corridors, out of nowhere he felt a sudden breeze and felt a hand grab him and heard a voice call out, "Kelly."

Severide let out a startled yelp and realized it was Casey standing in the shadows, he reached over and slapped the Truck lieutenant on the arm.

"Geez you scared me to death, Casey, what the hell are you creeping around for?" It was then that Kelly first thought to ask, "What're you even doing here?"

Though it was dark, Kelly could make out that Casey had changed into a long sleeve shirt and a dark pair of jeans, and that the blonde man seemed to be practically hugging himself as if he was still freezing.

"I was going stir crazy sitting around the apartment," Casey answered, "I sneaked back in."

"For what?"

"Can I stay with you in your quarters tonight?" Casey asked.

"What?" The question was so _out there_ that it caught Kelly completely off guard. The two of them had never slept in the same bed before, and Kelly had no idea how to react to the idea now.

His hesitance however had no impact on Casey's request.

"Please, Kelly."

Severide didn't get what it was all about, but he finally nodded. "Okay, sure, come on." He reached over and grabbed Casey's hand, then drew back in disgust, "Geez, you're still freezing!"

"I know," Casey said in a defeated tone, "I can't get warm, I've taken three showers and nothing's worked."

"You mean," Kelly couldn't stop himself from shaking his hand as if he'd caught something revolting off of Casey, "You've been like this all day?"

"Pretty much," Casey answered hesitantly.

Kelly couldn't believe it, Casey still felt like ice.

"Okay, come on," he nodded his head towards his room.

The two men quietly made their way through the halls and reached Severide's quarters. Kelly closed the door behind them and pointed to the side of the bed he'd been frequenting, where it should've still been fairly warm. "Over there."

Casey took his shoes off and slid under the covers and made an assortment of small contented grunts as he adjusted to the warmth of the bed. He looked at Kelly and asked, "What about you?"

"I'll be right back," Kelly opened the door and stepped out.

He went to the bunk room and quickly scanned the area, spotted an empty bunk near the lieutenants' quarters and stole the pillow and the top sheet off it.

"Severide, what the hell are you doing?" Brett Snow off Engine asked from the bunk on the opposite side.

"Shut up and go back to sleep, Snow, you're dreaming," Kelly told him.

Brett snorted. "Shakira is a dream, _you're_ a nightmare."

"Shut up," Kelly whopped him with the pillow in passing. Snow chuckled and tried to elbow Kelly as he walked past.

Kelly returned to his quarters, shut the door and went around to the other side of the bunk and made himself at home with the spare bedding.

"Everything okay?" Casey asked.

"Yeah, fine." Kelly thought for a minute, then sat up and looked at Casey. "It's 40 degrees outside, where's your jacket?"

"At home," Casey answered.

That explained why he was still so cold. "What'd you do, walk down here?"

"My truck's around the corner," Casey said, "I didn't want to risk Boden catching me and throwing me out."

"He wouldn't do that."

"You don't know."

"Alright, look," Kelly changed the subject, "I don't mind you staying with me, but let's go over the rules. Stay on your own side of the bed."

"Okay."

"Don't come over here."

"I won't."

"I want to sleep, so don't keep me up," Kelly told him.

"I won't."

Kelly was surprised, that went smoother than he thought it would. He guessed that Casey was just as exhausted as he was and just wanted to go to sleep, but he still couldn't figure out why Casey came back and asked to stay with him.

"Goodnight, Casey."

"Goodnight, Severide."

* * *

Kelly was going in and out of sleep and was not oblivious to the bunk shifting under him as Casey tossed and turned over on his side. The two of them in one bunk was a tight fit but so far Matt had kept his word and not rolled over on Kelly, and if Severide had to guess, he'd say that Casey had finally warmed up since he'd stopped shaking earlier.

"Kelly..."

But he could see the rule about not keeping him up was going out the window.

"Kelly..."

"What?" Severide groaned as he grabbed his pillow and pressed it over his head.

"I'm sorry to wake you up," Casey whispered, "but I need to talk to you."

"About what?" Kelly said, muffled by his pillow.

"Kelly...if I told you something...that seemed farfetched...would you...I mean, if I told you something that sounded bizarre...would you promise not to laugh at me?"

Now he had Severide's attention. Kelly lowered his pillow so one eye was visible and it looked through its corner at Matt as Kelly groggily asked, "Huh?"

"Kelly," Casey reached over and grabbed him, "I need you to wake up, I need to tell you something."

"Alright, alright, I'm up," Kelly sat up on the bed, "what's going on?"

Casey sat up too and faced him. "I need to tell you something, and I know you won't believe me, but I _need_ you to believe me. I'm not crazy and I'm not making this up."

"Okay," Kelly still wasn't quite all there yet and forced his eyes to stay wide open as he tried to rouse himself fully. "What's going on?"

Casey paused, and hesitantly inched his way into the explanation. "When we were at that house today, and I fell through the floor..."

"Uh huh."

"And I landed in the basement and hit the water..."

"Uh huh?" Kelly asked.

Casey was quiet for a minute, as if debating whether to continue or not. Finally, in a very small voice, he told Kelly, "Something grabbed me."

Kelly blinked. "Huh?"

"I felt somebody grab me and pull me under the water," Casey told him, his voice quiet but his tone very matter-of-fact, leaving no doubt that he wasn't joking.

Kelly took a few seconds to respond. "There wasn't anybody in that basement."

"I know," Casey answered.

Severide tried to make some sense of what he'd just been told.

"You probably got caught on something, that basement was a junk bin."

Casey shook his head. "No, Kelly, _somebody_ grabbed me. I felt a hand on my leg and it jerked me back and pulled me _under_ the water, that's why I couldn't get up."

The fear was present in Casey's voice now, and Kelly replayed the events of earlier that day and realized that that would've been the time he'd heard Casey screaming in the radio. _Kelly's blood ran cold. That wasn't a hurt scream. It was sheer terror and panic._ And he remembered that image of Casey screaming and flopping around in the water, trying to throw himself forward, trying to get away from something, instead he kept slipping, nearly falling under the surface. He remembered the surge of the water around them and how hard it pulled against them and how many times they both nearly fell to the floor, to anybody that alone would be a frightening experience, but that wasn't enough to justify Casey's unusual behavior at the time.

"I know how it sounds, that's why I didn't say anything earlier, I didn't want anybody to think I was crazy," Casey told him. "But I haven't been able to sleep thinking about it. That's why I came here, I thought maybe if I wasn't alone, I could stop thinking about it and sleep...but I still can't get it out of my head. There was _somebody_ in that basement with me."

Kelly wasn't sure what to think. He just looked at Casey, the only word he could get out, "Matt..."

He saw Casey's face contort with a new kind of fear, the fear of not being believed, something else that had clearly weighed heavily on his mind all day.

Kelly couldn't think of what to say. He grabbed Casey's wrist and pulled the blonde man over to him. Yes, he could finally feel that Casey's body temperature was back where it needed to be, but right now that was actually of little relief to him.

Before Casey could say what he was thinking, Kelly assured him, "I believe you." He actually wasn't sure _what_ he believed, but he knew Casey wouldn't make something like this up, and it was obvious how terrified Matt was by the whole experience. He could feel Casey's body trembling again, but this time it wasn't from the cold, it was fear.


	3. Chapter 3

"Chief, he is adamant that somebody pulled him under the water in that basement," Kelly told Boden early the next morning, after bringing Wallace up on everything he'd found out.

Boden sat at his desk and looked at Kelly as if measuring how much he believed of this story. "Did you see anyone in that basement?"

"No...I mean everything was insane, the power was out, I was trying to keep him up and not fall down myself...but there wasn't anybody else down there. The family got out."

"Couldn't have been a fourth person in the house? A roommate, an intruder, something?"

"I don't think so," Kelly shook his head. "I mean the water wasn't _that_ deep, if somebody else was there, we would've seen them."

"Where is Casey now?"

"Still asleep," Kelly answered, "he finally conked out about 3 o' clock this morning."

Boden slowly nodded his head.

"Chief...I think we need to go back and check the basement...just to make sure."

"That house is a death trap," Boden pointed out, "it would still have standing water in it now." He paused, and sighed as he pinched the bridge of his nose and thought about it all. "Any chance this is an after effect of the shock he was in?"

Kelly shrugged. "I guess it's possible, but he wasn't talking crazy at the hospital, we know that, and if the doctors heard him talking like this, I don't think they would've discharged him."

"Neither do I," Boden replied. "And it couldn't have been some debris he got pinned under? The broken boards from the floor?"

"He swears it was a hand," Kelly said.

"Which he felt _through_ his turnout gear," Boden said.

"I know it doesn't make sense. That's why I want to go back and double check and just make sure we didn't miss something, it's the only way I can see getting any peace of mind out of this," Kelly told him.

Wallace considered the idea, and asked Kelly, "Do you think Casey will be up for it?"

"I'll have to ask him. But I think if he knew he wasn't going in alone, he'd probably be okay with it."

Boden merely nodded. "I know it's been a short night for Casey, but go wake him up and let him know what we're doing. I'll tell the others we're going back to do a secondary search."

* * *

Otis and Cruz just finished running a ladder down through the broken basement window. Otis glanced down with his helmet light and told Boden, "Basement's still flooded."

"You sure you want to do this?" Kelly asked Casey, who had changed into a fresh set of turnout gear and ridden out with his company.

Casey merely nodded and headed over to the window and was the first one down the ladder, Kelly followed after him, and to both their surprise, Boden was the next one to descend into the basement, and told the others to stand by. Casey winced as he felt the water sloshing around his knees, if he lost his balance he could easily wind up on the floor again, but the water wasn't rushing like it had been the other day.

"Something's wrong here," Kelly said, "how's there still this much water?"

"The sump pump should've kept the basement from flooding in the first place," Casey realized.

"And where's that?" Kelly asked.

Casey looked around the floor, "Should be here somewhere."

Boden used his light to look around, there was no shortage of stuff floating in the water, and the rest was still just sunk on the bottom like a stone. But there didn't appear to be anything that could've pinned Casey down, certainly nothing that could reasonably be mistaken for a person.

"What's this?" Kelly's light shone on a large square in the middle of the floor with a large metal ring attached to it.

"_That_ should be where the sump pump is," Casey said.

"Yeah well you can't get it open with four feet of water on top of it," Kelly said.

Casey looked over at Boden, "Chief, all due respect, you know what'll happen if this water isn't moved out of here."

"I do, and I know it's not our job," Wallace replied. He inhaled and added, "And we're going to do it anyway, _after_ shift change."

"I _have_ a sump pump we can use, Chief," Casey said, "If I can run home to get it..."

"Go," Boden nodded towards the ladder. He turned and looked at the others who were crowded around the basement window. "While that's going on, we're going to speed up the process by bailing out what we can."

* * *

An hour after shift change, everybody from Truck and Squad was back at the house and chain ganging five gallon buckets of water up the ladder to whoever was standing by at the window who'd take the buckets, pour them out by the street and then rotate the empty ones back to the men in the basement. The water was still freezing cold and everybody was miserable as they worked, but it still wasn't as bad as it had been during the downpour.

Mouch groaned and bent over to ease his back and commented, "Still waters run deep."

"What the hell does that even mean?" Cruz asked.

"It means what it means," Mouch replied as he straightened his back.

Even Severide had to take a breather and sit on one of the lower rungs on the ladder to rest a minute.

"The family that lives here needs to sue the realtor that sold them this place," he said, "this is a nightmare."

It took the rest of the morning but they finally got the water in the basement down to just a few inches. Everybody was soaked through, freezing cold, hungry, exhausted, but the worst of it was finally over. Casey went back to the trap door, grabbed the ring and slowly pulled it up. Severide shone his flashlight under the door and let loose with a few choice words.

"There's no sump pump, just a hole in the ground and a five gallon bucket!" he said.

"So _that's_ why the whole place got flooded," Otis said.

"I ought to track down the realtor and kick their ass myself," Kelly grunted as he reached in and pulled up the bucket, that was overflowing with water. He shone his light back in the hole, turned it to an angle, and then screamed.

Everybody in the basement gathered around the hole to see what was the matter, and everybody had similar reactions at the sight of the decomposed body folded in the hole beside where the bucket was.

* * *

Casey sat on the bumper for the ambulance and felt his legs shaking, and tried to will them to stop shaking, but without success. Kelly came up with two bottles of water and asked him, "How're you holding up?"

Matt's eyes looked straight ahead and he said in an almost robotic voice, "She grabbed me...a dead woman grabbed me."

"Casey, she was buried in the floor, there's no way-"

"I _felt_ it, Kelly," Casey told him. He looked to the side and added, "I didn't tell you because I knew you'd think I'd really lost it...I felt the bones...it was like a claw grabbing me. I _knew_ there was something wrong about the whole thing, I knew it didn't feel like a normal hand...but I couldn't put it together at the time."

Kelly sat beside him on the bumper and asked him, "There's nothing I can say to convince you you're wrong, is there?"

Matt looked at him, his eyes full of determination. "I _know_ what I felt, Kelly."

Severide merely nodded and responded, "Okay."

"I'm _not_ crazy, Kelly."

"I know," he answered. "It's a lot to take in...but I believe you."

Casey looked at him, his eyes told Kelly that he wasn't sure how to respond to that. Finally the upper half of his body started shaking with the lower half and he looked like he was about to collapse. Kelly reached an arm around Casey and pulled the blonde man against him, "Take it easy, it's over now."

"What," Casey looked over to the small crowd gathered around the basement window, "what're they saying? Do they know who...she was?"

"Medical examiner figures she's been dead for about 10 years based on the rate of decomp...it's possible she used to live here but they're going to have to try and ID her by her dental records."

"And who killed her?" Casey wanted to know.

Kelly shook his head. "I don't know. I don't know, but they're going to find out now, Casey, because of you."

Casey shook his head. "_Her_."

* * *

Kelly walked over to Casey's door and lightly knocked before opening it. Not much to his surprise, Casey was in bed but he wasn't asleep and looked like he hadn't been.

"Hey, you doing okay?" Kelly asked.

Casey just shrugged. "I don't even know how to answer that."

"Can I come in?"

"Sure."

Kelly walked over to the bed and quietly announced, "It's after midnight."

Casey just barely nodded.

"It's Halloween."

Casey nodded again.

"You got any plans for tomorrow?" Kelly asked.

"Does staying in bed and waiting for the whole day to be over count?" Casey asked. After a pause he asked Severide, "Do you believe in ghosts, Kelly?"

The Squad lieutenant shrugged. "I never really thought about it, I guess."

"I never did either," Casey responded, then lowly added, "why me? Why did she pick me?"

Kelly shrugged, "Probably because she knew you wouldn't let it go."

"But _how_ could she know it?" Casey asked.

"I don't know," Kelly tried to lighten the mood, "Maybe you give off a vibe."

That earned him a weak elbow to the ribs.

Casey shook his head, "I still can't believe it."

"Neither can I," Kelly told him. "This is one Halloween nobody's _ever_ going to forget."

The air was thick with tension as neither of them said anything after that. Finally Kelly asked, somewhat sheepishly, "You want some company tonight?"

Again, it wasn't anything they'd ever done before, but after everything that had happened, Kelly wasn't sure about leaving Casey alone that night, or for that matter, being alone himself in a separate room.

Casey looked at him, and merely responded, "I wouldn't say 'no' to it right now."

Kelly was relieved to hear that.

"You got an extra blanket?"

"In the closet," Casey nodded his head towards the door.

Kelly opened it up and took a heavy flannel blanket off the top shelf and made himself at home in the unoccupied side of the double bed. He got comfortable, then looked over at Casey, who still just stared straight ahead, and asked him, "You still cold?"

"A little," Casey admitted.

Kelly grabbed the ends of his blanket, opened it all the way up and draped half of it over Matt.

"Thank you," he replied. If Kelly didn't know better, he'd swear in that moment he could see the muscles in Casey's back and neck starting to relax.

"When I was a kid," Casey said, it was so sudden that Kelly almost missed it, he continued, "When I had nightmares I used to run across the hall and get into bed with Christie. Half the time she kicked me out and sent me back."

"And the other half?" Kelly asked.

"It depended," Casey answered. "One time when I was about 8, she told our parents we were going to see "Who Framed Roger Rabbit", and instead when we got there she sneaked us in to see "The Blob"...and we were both so scared after that, at night I could hear these noises outside...I slept with her for a week."

Kelly chuckled. "You never told me about that."

"I hadn't thought about it for so long...looking back now it's hard to believe that's the same sister I have now," Casey said.

There was a silence between them for a moment. There didn't seem to be anything else left to say.

"Goodnight, Matt."

"Goodnight, Kelly."

* * *

Kelly had just finished restocking the candy bowl when he heard another knock on the door. He called out to Casey, "I'll get it!" and went back to the front door with the bowl in hand.

A dozen kids of assorted ages in various costumes held up bags and plastic pumpkins, "Trick or treat!"

They'd been coming steadily for 2 hours and showed no signs of letting up yet. Kelly doled out the candy to the pirate, the gypsy, the clown, the two elves, the four junior high girls in face paint to look like their school mascot, a little girl in a bathrobe with a granny wig full of curlers and a dozen stuffed cats pinned to her robe, points for originality on that one...

Then he did a double take when he came face to face with somebody his own height dressed in a long black coat, black gloves, black pants, black boots, a wide brimmed black hat, carrying a heavy black cane and wearing a white plague mask with red eyes and a long curved beak.

"Whoa, what grade are you in?" Kelly asked.

The person inside the costume said nothing as they stuck their free hand into the bowl and extricated all the Almond Joys out of it, then turned and slowly walked away, their cane tapping out an ominous sound as they left.

Kelly took a step back and swung the door shut behind him. "That's the weirdest costume all night." He set the bowl down and returned to the living room where Casey was sitting on the couch and just hanging up his phone.

"That was Antonio."

"What'd he say?" Kelly asked.

"They got a match to the dead woman's dental records and identified her as Eileen Harrison, a 56 year old woman who disappeared 10 years ago. Her family called the police to report her missing after they hadn't heard from her in 2 weeks, but nothing ever came of it."

Kelly sat down on the end of the couch and asked, "She used to live in that house?"

"She rented the basement apartment."

"I thought the McIntyres owned it outright?"

"They do, _now_. They only moved in two years ago. 10 years ago it was a housing apartment, so the cops tracked down the guy who used to own it. He just confessed that he killed Eileen during a fight, then buried her under the basement floor, then sold the house and left Chicago."

It took a minute for Kelly to take all that in, the only thing he could think to say in response was, "Guess he didn't go too far."

"Elgin," Casey answered.

"Man...you mean he just admitted to it because the cops showed up?" Severide asked.

"I guess he had a guilty conscience after all this time," Casey said.

"Yeah...or maybe you weren't the only person Eileen's been haunting lately." In response to the look Casey shot him, he pointed out, "Who knows? Maybe something or _someone_ convinced the landlord it was in his best interest to confess."

Casey just shook his head and told him, "This is so bizarre, Kelly."

"Yeah, I know...but on the upside that's got to be a world record for solving a cold case they just discovered," Severide remarked.

Casey looked at him and said, "I...don't really want to talk about it right now, Severide."

"Okay, sorry."

Kelly thought for a minute and asked Casey, "You want to hide out in the bushes and scare the trick-or-treaters when they come by?"

Casey had a good laugh at that suggestion but shook his head, "No."

Kelly thought again. "You just want to watch TV?"

Casey considered it and finally nodded. Kelly picked up the remote and looked for a channel playing something good. One of the first ones he stopped on was playing 'The Amityville Horror'.

"No!" Casey objected.

Kelly flipped through a few more channels and commented, "Maybe not," and came to another channel that was currently playing "Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein". Not what either of them were planning to see, but it was something they'd both seen growing up and were familiar with it, and after a few minutes were both laughing at. After the last couple days they'd had it was just the kind of brainless entertainment they needed to take the edge off for the night.

* * *

As the night was winding down, the trick-or-treaters had finally stopped coming about an hour ago, and the two firefighters had laughed themselves sick through an all night marathon of old horror comedies, Abbott and Costello meeting Frankenstein, the 3 Stooges encountering space men, the East Side Kids in a haunted house, and somebody named Old Mother Riley dealing with Bela Lugosi and a crazy robot, stuff they'd never seen before and it didn't make any sense whatsoever, but it had made for an amusing evening.

Kelly looked at the clock and saw it would be midnight before too long, then he looked over and saw Casey had started to nod off and had his head on his chest.

"Hey," he reached over and nudged Casey with one hand as he grabbed the remote to shut off the TV with the other.

"Hmm? Huh?" Casey slowly asked as he forced his eyes open and sat up straight.

"Happy Halloween, Casey."

Matt blinked his eyes a few times to finally get them to stay open and he grumbled something tiredly and nodded as he yawned, then responded, "Happy Halloween, Kelly."


End file.
